It has been over a year since we wrote a blog post.  This blog has been a wonderful way to keep in touch with family & friends and chronicle our transition from a home to our new Full Time RV life.  We are now going on 6 years in our RV Journey and love it just as much as day one!  One thing that has changed is our communication style.  The blog has proven to be very time consuming and expensive!  However, it was still a great experience!

If you'd like to continue to follow our travels, please follow us on Facebook at our page:  Wandering by Design.  Hope to see you there!

​Rick & Julie

We have been back from our 25th Anniversary trip of a lifetime for just about a month and we are definitely back to reality!  Once we landed back in the US we hit the ground running.  We picked up the truck from fellow RV'ing friends and went over to Grand Design's new factory service center to pick up our rig.  They took good care of our home while we were gone and checked off the repair list from our black water flush mishap earlier in the spring.  The new facility is huge and so clean!  It felt like we walked into a showroom, with our home on display!  We spent 2 nights at the old service centers campground to get the coach put back together and then we were off!

From there we pointed the coach north towards WI.  Our biggest to do's this summer was to get our boys moved into an apartment, Dr's appts and now, follow up on the wrist fracture.  With all of this on our plate, we had to sadly decline a fourth year at Scout Camp in Rhinelander, WI.  

We broke the trip to WI up with a night at Cliffside Campground in Racine, WI.  Sites were spacious and paved.  You can make reservations online and go directly to your site.  What a gem of a county park near the bluffs of Lake Michigan!   We will definitely be back there someday.

From there we headed to our old stomping grounds in Washington County, WI.  We spent the first week at Pike Lake State Park.  From here we had family over for some yummy smoked pulled pork and pork belly.  We also weathered a big storm but we were prepared and had battened down the hatches.  

We then moved over to our long term site at Lake Lenwood Campground in West Bend, where we have spent the last couple weeks working on finding an apartment for the boys, spending time with family and friends and taking in a good ol small town 4th of July parade!  We even squeezed in a quick stop at Strawberry Festival in Cedarburg, WI, with everything from strawberry wine to strawberry brats!

But this last week has been all about taking care of things around the coach and truck.  The saying, "When it rains, it pours" has certainly proved itself, several times over this last several days!  It started with a smell in the RV and after ruling out sour food, dead rodents and smelly clothes in the rig, we moved to the storage compartments outside.  Upon taking down the wall in the front bay we found some water dripping.  If you've read our previous post about our black water flush mishap, you can understand that we are on high alert to anything water related!  There was a leak somewhere but it was soo small that we couldn't readily see it and find the source.  After a day of diagnosing, we discovered the water pump had a cracked seal.  Amazon to the rescue!  As if on queue, the plastic hot water heater check valve decided to give up the ghost too.  Luckily we had a brass valve, just waiting for this very issue. But, that didn't seem to be where the smell was originating from.  From there it was time to open up the underbelly and sure enough, we had water in the underbelly that, when pushing on the coroplast, came out in a gut-wrenching little waterfall!  Long story short, Rick was able to finally diagnose that there was a crack in the gray tank, which related back to the black tank flush issue in spring.  After frantic conversations with Progressive, Grand Design  and a local mobile RV tech, we were able to have Progressive send out an adjuster, authorize the repair, order the tank from GD and get a mobile tech to install...mission complete in 5 days!  A small miracle as RV parts are still in short supply...as we will soon find out.  

While the tech installed the new tank, Rick was able to work on our entry handle.  After time and the elements, the foam grip was starting to shred a bit on the ends.  We decided to go with a self-fusing, waterproof bike handelbar tape to wrap it.  We really like the way it stays in place and looks.

You would think that would have been the end of our issues, but we soon discovered that our awning was not functioning properly and, as before, we thought it was just readjusting the fabric a bit.  Unfortunately, upon further inspection, we found one of the gas struts decided to also give up the ghost!  This is where the rv parts woes really came into play.  After exhaustive searches online and calling at least a dozen RV parts stores and dealerships, there was not another gas strut to be found! Our last hope was to go straight to the manufacturer and surprisingly found that you can order parts from them directly.  We placed an order online and even paid for expedited shipping only to find out that due to the pandemic, they are still behind and it would be 4 to 6 weeks, and that may even be with expedited shipping.  Well, at least we know we will get one some time.  Unfortunately, we are starting to move again this week, so we are having it shipped to a family members home.  This is one of the downfalls of this lifestyle, but hopefully we will have it within a month and be able to use our awning again.

Last but not least, we had the lock actuator go out on the drivers door of the truck.  This means that the keyfob cannot lock and unlock the vehicle unless you manually lock or unlock that door.  Gasp, oh the horror...we need to actually use the key to lock the door!  Its just like having to get up and turn the channel on the TV in the old days!!!  It is a minor inconvenience, but we were able to get an appointment at the local Ford dealer in early August to get it fixed.  The good thing is, it is covered under warranty and bonus, they can get the part by then!

Rick's final task to cross of the "To Do" list while we were here was to clean and inspect the roof and AC units.  It was pretty dirty and the AC units had their fair share of cottonwood tree puffy seed pods.  Some days when the wind is blowing just right, those little guys make it look like its snowing!

Outside of that, we have completed most all of the Dr's appts and tests and xrays look really good on the wrist!  No surgery and no physical therapy needed!  The brace has come off and the only restriction is to ease into lifting things.  And believe it or not, I am looking forward to getting back on the bike!  Just as long as there is no sand anywhere nearby!!

We are excited for the boys, as we help them move into their next chapter and their first apartment this weekend!  Then we are off to our next adventure for a couple weeks before we come back for some more family time at the beginning of August and wrap up things in WI.  Even though we weren't able to volunteer for the summer up at scout camp, we were able to find an opportunity to volunteer for a week at one of our favorite venues.  More on that next time...​

​​​​​​SHOP AMAZON HERE
Would you like to help support our blog and keep these updates coming?  It is easy to help, just do your Amazon shopping through the link above.  You still get all your Amazon Prime benefits and the prices are the same.  Since we are in the Amazon affiliate program,  any shopping you do through our link, provides a little kickback to support this blog.  
Thank you for stopping by!!!

That title has soo many meanings right now for us.  First, it's a wrap on our hiatus from this blog.  Our last post was 1/16/22 and that was about our travels last fall up to the end of September.  The title also means that we are wrapping up our 6+month stay in FL.  I guess we really are residents now. It also means that we have wrapped up our workamper stints for awhile as we start to travel again and it also means that my tax season gig is wrapping up as well. There is also a wrap on Julie's arm.  So what have we been doing the past 7+ months??  We will try to catch you up to speed in this blog with some highlights.

First of all, we embarked on a new workamping gig in TN; helping a fellow RV'ing family realize their dream of an event center and destination overlooking a beautiful lake in Central TN, a half hour east of Nashville.  This was again a unique workamping opportunity where we helped with the remodeling of a huge estate home overlooking the lake, a little bit of help with the beginning development of a campground for guests and workampers, some visioning of an old chapel for future events,  a bit of food service planning with Rick's background as a chef and then providing companionship and fun for parents of our hosts while they were busy getting the business up and running.  October was a fun month of new experiences for us.  Here is some pictures of our time on Center Lake.  Check out Paul and Tina's amazing transformation of this property at ​Due West Properties.  Our time was not all work, and were able to see lots of sites in the area.  We were also able to meet up with friends in TN and GA.  Sorry, Sally, we never got a picture together but we got BBQ at Ridgewood!

Our trip thereafter to FL was an uneventful one with a quick Harvest Host stopover in southern GA and then it was off to a new workamping gig for our longest time ever in one spot.  We were unsure how we would like being in one spot for so long, but the camp location was wonderful, out on a peninsula, outside of Leesburg.  We stumbled upon Warren Willis Camp and Conference Center last winter when we stayed at Recreation Plantation, outside of The Villages.  We went for a visit and were immediately welcomed in and given a tour.  We were soo impressed by the place that we thought our good friends and workamper buddies, the Golden's,  would also enjoy this opportunity and we all signed up for the 2021-2022 winter season. We arrived at the end of October and quickly set up in our little oasis.  Rick built a picnic table for our site and we purchased a fire pit which got some use with gathering with friends, new and old. 
​
​We were some of the first workampers to arrive for the season and through the months of November and December, many more workampers arrived, old and new, to make a robust group of over 50!!  We had certainly outnumbered the staff as they were hit hard by Covid cutbacks, so the work  we were able to assist with was much appreciated and helped make this comeback year a success.  Since the property is situated on nearly 300 acres with numerous buildings on both the camp and conference sides, there was alot of work to be done to not only operate day to day but get the property back in shape after a long pandemic hiatus.  Job duties ran the gamut.  There was grounds work, building maintenance, housekeeping, laundry, food service and a host of other job duties.  We were able to draw upon our past experiences in food service, housekeeping, organization and  business skills to help get the camp back to pre-pandemic operating levels.  It was alot of hard work at times but the appreciation expressed by staff and guests made it all worthwhile.  We will be back this next winter season!!  

A bonus to being in the area was to spend time with family and friends.  Several of Julie's family now live in The Villages, including her Dad and Stepmom, who moved down from WI in June.  We were able to help them get settled in to their new digs and spend some time enjoying the beautiful FL winter and visiting with other relatives who came to visit.  We took advantage of the week we get off of work at the camp in late December to spend Christmas with family in WI with a Christmas Day Milwaukee Bucks game with our boys.

Another highlight was spending time with RV'ing friends visiting the area and those workamping with us.  We met up with our RV'ing friends, the Wirt's, along with the Golden's and spent a great couple days at Disney in a lovely condo, compliments of the Wirt's  Disney Vacation membership.  The six of us also met up in mid-December to go see the Christmas lights at Weeki Watchee State Park.  We also met up with fellow Grand Design RV'ing friends who were in the area and dang if we didn't miss pictures with some, we were having too much fun!

The Daytona 500 was certainly a highlight of our spring in FL!  It was a great day for a race and we really enjoyed, not only the race, but all the people watching  and pre-race festivities.

Another bucket list item was attending the largest RV show in Tampa.  With over 1,500 RV's and over 450 vendor booths, there was no way to see it all in one day so we spent a night in Tampa to take it all in.  We certainly saw many interesting RV's, were in disbelief at the unreal prices that people were paying but were able to develop a short list of RV's that may be "The One", if we ever sell the coach we have, which is still the best RV for us!

But all this fun was punctuated with the daily living activities and some lowlights, shitty lowlights, really shitty, but more about that in a minute.  Shortly after we arrived, we noticed that we had a flat tire.  Upon further inspection, it was a bent rim that caused it.  After a call to the manufacturer, they stood behind their product in not only sending us a new rim, but also a check to have it installed...within the week  WOW!  Now that is customer service!
​
The regular maintenance and upkeep, like replacing a light cover we lost on the way down, cleaning the hot water heater, washing the rig, awning and roof were necessary tasks that we tackled.  But none of these prepared us for a lazy Sunday afternoon when we dumped the tanks as usual with a thorough rinse of the black tank, when we lost track of time, and were quickly brought back to reality when we heard the gut wrenching sound of water gurgling and trickling off the roof!  Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit...the black tank overflowed, backed up the vent stack to the roof and overflowed into the RV!!!!  While Rick ran to shut off the water and open the tank valve, I ran inside, only to be met by semi-shitty water backing up in to the bathroom, hall and bedroom of the upper level.  You have never seen two people move soo fast with anything available to get that cleaned up,  Unfortunately some leaked down into the bay below the bedroom and the front cap. We did file an insurance claim and will have the repair work done at the Grand Design factory in May.   Fortunately, our quick work to clean it all up led to minimal damage and a compliment by the insurance adjuster telling us we should really teach other RV'ers what to do in this scenario.  So there's that...

Tax time this year was kinda rough with trying to balance workamping and the challenges of Covid time taxes, which brought it's own complexities.  But, we made it through and look forward to a more normal year next spring.

We wrapped up our time at Warren Willis in early April, after 5 plus months, and headed for some R&R at Strawberry Fields for RV'ers in Chiefland, FL.  It was a great, newer park, with paved sites and all the amenities, including a wonderful, cheap laundry room, which we always appreciate.  While I wrapped up taxes, Rick was able to wash the rig since our rig was no longer under the live oaks with a continuous shower of moss.  Boy was our baby dirty!

We also went for a long bike ride on another rails to trails paved path which took us to Old Town, FL and a train trestle bridge over the Suwanee River.  This was a ride where we, inadvertently, tested our ebike batteries where Rick's died as we rolled back into the parking lot.

Another day we took time to explore Cedar Key and have some wonderful, fresh seafood overlooking the bay.

Our final stop in FL was in St. Augustine.  We have wanted to stop and explore the oldest town in the US every time we came to or from FL but never had the time.  This time was different.  We carved out several days to play tourist and enjoy our time exploring.  We visited the Castillo de San Marcos fort, explored St. Georges street, took a walk to the beach and enjoyed a guided golf cart tour of the old city.  We even had time to meet up with new friends we workamped with at Warren Willis for a delicious dinner at the Conch House overlooking Matanzas Bay in a elevated tiki hut.  What a fun experience!

The end of April had us moving through GA, stopping to visit RV'ing friends who have since settled down in St. Mary's, GA.  We enjoyed catching up with both Dave & Dawn, who we workamped with at Valley River RV Resort in 2020 and Rick and Vonceil, fellow Grand Design owners, who we met while staying near Galveston, TX for a month in early 2020.  Unfortunately, your seeing a trend, we didn't get pictures...ughhh.  While in the area, we took a day trip to the Okefenokee Swamp for a great hike and saw some gators and other wildlife.  Steffens was also on the agenda for some awesome country fried steak!  Seriously addicting and a must have when we're in the area.

We then headed up the coast to Brunswick, where we went on a wonderful bike ride of Jekyll Island, which was picture perfect until... Julie unexpectedly met some soft sand that really wanted her to stop and lay in it!  That tumble resulted in a trip to the urgent care and a fractured right wrist!  Injuries while traveling full time are never easy or fun, but amazingly, we were able to find a orthopedic office in Savannah, our next stop who was able to fit us in, and because of our mobile lifestyle, put a heavy duty splint on rather than a cast so that we could continue or planned travels but still ensure the wrist was immobile.  A follow up visit there showed the wrist was healing nicely and barring any unforeseen complications, no additional follow-up would needed.  

Savannah had been a planned stop for some time as the Gramoll sisters were bringing Rick's mom for a girls trip.  After 2 months of creative fibbing to his Mom as to our whereabouts, we were able to surprise her one night on an evening dinner cruise, and boy was she happy!  We spent more time with everyone the next day and had a BBQ back at our site at Skidaway Island State Park.

After that quick visit we made our way to visit our dear friends, Ryan and Vicki in Jamestown, NC.  We stayed at our favorite Oak Hollow Campground, a city park in High Point and spent the long weekend catching up and enjoying alot of fantastic food!  ​

We are now making our way north to drop of our rig at Grand Design, in Elkhart, IN,  for some work while we take a once in a lifetime, pandemic delayed, 25th Anniversary trip to Germany, Rome, a western Mediterranean cruise and finally a couple days in London.  To say we are excited  is a monumental understatement!  There is alot of work still to be done when we get to IN to prepare the rig and get ready for our almost month long excursion overseas.

If you are on Facebook, you can like our Wandering by Design page to see updates as we travel through Europe.  We hope to post as we have WIFI and look forward to sharing this exciting trip with you!

September ushered in a month of exploring from OH, a quick trip into SE MI, PA, NY, back to PA and then back to NY and all topped off with VA.  Whew, ya, it was a busy month of being a tourist again!  We hit some great locations and saw some incredible things along the way.  

We stayed for the first week of September at Maumee Bay State Park outside of Toledo, OH.  This was a really great state park that also had a resort lakeside with dining and a golf course.  The sites were paved, with water and electric and had decent spacing between them.  The only downfall was the dump station.  For the size of the campground, they really need to double the size of the dump station.  Most morning there were lines backing up well onto the roads.  We explored their visitor center and extensive boardwalk trail through the marshes.  Our e-bikes got a workout here on their several trails and through all of the campground loops. 

We took a day trip to The Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, MI.  I have to say, if you are EVER in the area, this is a must do.  This could easily be a two day visit.  There are three major components to the experience.  The museum itself which has amazing exhibits, including one of the first steam engines, JFK's presidential car that he rode in on that fateful day and the Rosa Parks bus.  To sit in that seat where she made history was awe inspiring! Then there is the adjacent, 80 acre  Greenfield Village, made up of 7 historic districts, that include a collection of historic buildings, including Henry Ford's boyhood home, Thomas Edison's shop where the lightbulb was invented and the Wright Brothers bicycle workshop where they began their vision of flying.  The third piece of this amazing experience is the Ford Rogue Factory tour where the F150 truck is built.  Even though the factory was not in active production the day we visited, it was very amazing to walk the plant and see just how the parts and pieces come together to create the finished product.  Even the intro video, which, spoiler alert, is just not a movie on a screen, was the coolest thing ever!  Very impressed with the entire experience and will certainly be back when we can explore it more in depth.  We ended the day with a meet up with another of Rick's Army buddies he was stationed with in Germany.  Good to see you John!

It was then time to pull up the jacks and explore PA.  We took the northerly route along Lake Erie and stayed at Indian Creek RV & Camping Resort in Geneva On The Lake, PA.  During the summer months, this area is a hopping vacation destination, but in September it was a sleepy little town.  This Sun RV resort was a surprisingly nice Passport America location.  I probably would not stay here during the summer, since about three quarters of the park is seasonal sites, but we stayed in a nice transient area with a pull thru site and views of the ponds where ducks and geese were plentiful.  They had a couple laundry areas throughout the park and we got caught up on laundry while we were there.  While in the area, we explored the Lake Erie parks and shoreline, the covered bridges and even a wine tasting at one of their many wineries.

From PA we were off to NY, a new state for us.  Our first stop was the Niagara Falls area.  We stayed at Branches of Niagara in Grand Island, just south of Niagara Falls.  It was a nice park and quiet this time of year with mostly retired couples during the week...like us!   Of course we spent 2 days at the falls and took the Maiden of the Mist boat tour!  It was a great time!  Unfortunately, we did not get to go over to the Canadian side of the falls due to all the crazy Covid restrictions and hoops but we hope to some day travel through Canada and see the falls from that side.  What a great place to visit and the volume of water going over those falls is amazing.  Another day we went up to Fort Niagara, which was really interesting to learn about the history there..

After our quick week at Niagara Falls, we moved on further into NY to explore more falls and lakes.  We stayed at a great Boondockers Welcome in the Finger Lakes region of NY.  We had heard alot about this area and it did not disappoint!  We spent a day at Watkins Glenn State Park enjoying a great hike through the gorge. We also drove around a couple of the lakes in the area, explored a neat farm & craft market and visited the town of "Bedford Falls", aka Seneca Falls, featured in the movie Its A Wonderful Life.

Again, another lake was in our future.  We moved up to Lake George area in upstate NY and stayed at Whippoorwill Campground.  This stop included a boat tour of Lake George, a great bike trail, Saratoga Springs State Park, Saratoga Springs National Park and an afternoon with another of Rick's Army buddies, Kevin, who took us on a great walking tour of Saratoga Springs, showed us the bar where American Pie was written and a beautiful park.  He loves to take pictures and gave us an impromptu photo shoot!

After our quick couple days in upstate NY, we moved on back into PA, on our trek south.  We stayed at another great Boondockers Welcome just west of Philadelphia for the weekend so we could go explore Philly.  We were fortunate to get into the last tour of the day for Independence Hall and felt very humbled to be standing were our founding fathers did.  We took a stroll around the historic area and was able to see the Liberty Bell and Ben Franklins resting place.  Of course we had to have some cheesesteaks while in Philly!  After dinner we took a stroll on the riverfront, which had a really cool vibe.

After that whirlwind weekend, we headed to our final September destination in VA for some peace and quiet.  Endless Caverns campground, in New Market, VA, was just what we needed to relax and unwind.  It also where we picked up alot of hitchhikers...stink bugs!!!  Ugghhh, even now, in January, we are still getting rid of them!  While there we explored New Market, the Virginia Museum of the Civil War and the Shenandoah National Park.  The Skyline Drive was a beautiful drive and we stopped at several areas to hike (even on the Appalachian Trail) and explore.  We also made a road trip one day to the new National Museum of the US Army in Fort Belvoir, outside of Washington, DC.  What a beautiful, well done tribute to the American soldier!

Whew...that was quite a month!  We certainly enjoyed all of our stops, the things we learned and the folks we met along the way!  Up next, quick visits with old friends before our next workamping gig.